When I was a kid I remember that my mum had lots of interesting spices in her larder and occasionally, when my hunt for Wagon Wheels proved fruitless, I would pick up the spices and give them a good old sniff. in particular I remember there being a box of cloves in an old green box. On the box was a painting of an exotic island with a dhow boat sailing pat. It sticks in my mind because it also had a rather freaky picture of a sultan on it. The island was Zanzibar, the spice island, and it was Zanzibar [View Full Entry]

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Jambo (hello in Swahili)! It has been awhile since our last blog and so this one will be a long one. So much has happened since we landed in Nairobi March 11th. Nairobi We flew Kenya Airways from Cairo to Nairobi and we had very low expectations for the airline, but it was fine. The flight was not very full apart from the Zimbabwean Police/UN Peacekeepers on the flight. We were again staying at the Hilton (on points) and we were lucky enough to check in at 6 am. We had a zillion errands to run and after a quick sleep, [View Full Entry]

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March 3rd, 2006, Day 57 of our cruise of 105 Zanzibar, Tanzania Very, very hot, maybe the hottest of all our ports We had a wonderful safe day with our friends and Mohamoud the II; we walked 5 hours. I hope you enjoy the pictures Hello my children, hello granny. Ttys, love to all [View Full Entry]

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Zanzibar Now that we had 2 ½ weeks of safaris, it was time for some R&R. So we boarded a plane for Zanzibar. Off we went to Pongwe beach resort. Both of us have done many beach vacations, but this was out of this world. First, our accommodations were amazing. We had a little hut, on the beach (sand outside our door) complete with our own beach chairs, shade and trees as well as a hammock. It was just decadent! Second, the tide in Zanzibar is very dramatic. When it goes out, it leaves less than 12 inches of water for [View Full Entry]

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After a superb Ethiopian Meal at Addis in Dar in Dar es Salaam, we took the ferry the next day to Stone Town, Zanzibar. Stone Town has a interesting culture with a mix of Persian, Arabic, Indian and Bantu influences. To this day, one can see the influences in the exquisitely carved doors of most Zanzibari homes. Zanzibar was a city state until the 16th century with key trade links between Africa and Asia. After being a Portuguese colony briefly, it was ruled by the Omani Sultans until 1963. It then was joined with Tanganyika to form Tanzania. To this day, [View Full Entry]

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Zanzibar Spice Tour Companions The spice farm tour was absolutely the BEST value to date! For $10 each, we were picked up at our hotel joining 12 or so others in the ubiquitous Toyota minivan matatu, given a first rate tour by an excellent guide, a good lunch, a trip to the swim in the Indian Ocean at a private beach, and then back to the hotel. Not once did the guide or the driver ask for additional money, a welcome relief, although in this case, we certainly would have tipped the guide if he hadn’t disappeared without asking. Although we [View Full Entry]

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Spice Farm The Zanzibar Government owns about 60 percent of the land, so this was a government farm, although it appeared that many small, village-like communities existed. Spices are fascinating, and our guide could tell us where each originated, and showed us each spice and explained its season, harvest and any required processing. Here is a photo of us at lunch. Fish in coconut sauce, green vegetable, chappati, banana, etc. Nutmeg, Mace You peel off the outer part of the nutmeg, leaving a beautiful, bright red lacy substance around the nutmeg nut itself. The red lacy s [View Full Entry]

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Zanzibar - Sunday 2/19 We slept in a bit Sunday morning because we didn’t have to leave for the tour until 9:00 am when they were to pick us up. We enjoyed a breakfast of toast and jam, coffee/tea, and the strange fried eggs they cook up in this part of Africa. It turns out that the egg yolks here are almost white, not yellow. They stir the yolk around before frying the egg into an overdone fried egg with no yolk. About 9:00 we wandered out into the lane in front of the hotel to wait for our ride. To [View Full Entry]

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We only meet travelers by the way that we travel. We are in the cheaper hotels, the cheaper eating places, and the cheapest Internet places. By and large, we are in the cheaper shopping districts, since I guess that most tourists stick pretty close to pre-marked prices in the hotels or in the special shops to which they are directed. Not us! As a result, when we meet fellow travelers, our conversations usually center on where they have been, where they are going, what they recommend, and what they don’t recommend. Sometimes we see the same people from time to time. [View Full Entry]

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Ferry to Zanzibar - Saturday 2/18 Because we didn’t have to be at the ferry until ten, we had plenty of time to wake up and eat breakfast at a leisurely pace. We packed only our daypacks for the two nights in Zanzibar and left main packs with the hotel for $500 Tsh each per day. Originally we had planned to walk to the ferry, but due to our leisurely pace we were running late and had to take a cab. It was probably best that we did, because our driver was able to drop us off right in front of [View Full Entry]

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